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Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Notes from RE consult #3

Following up on the last post, I did actually get AF later that day! So, that issue resolved, I guess. I should be ovulating sometime in the next few days, but this and the next cycle will be natural. Yesterday I met with a new RE from a famous national practice. It's in my state, but about an hour and a half from my house. I was in the "neighborhood" (relatively speaking) for work yesterday, so I made an appointment. The meeting was very interesting and I learned a lot of fascinating things. The doctor thinks that we have several factors at work here, all to do with me: 1) endometriosis - the fact that some was found and removed is important. He says even if it was a mild case, there can be damage or problems on a microscopic level that is causing problems. 2) my FSH level was a little high one of the times it was tested (it was 8.0 in September and 6.4 in October) - the 6.4 is OK but 8 means that it's creeping up. He says it normally goes up gradually over time with age, the fact that it's fluctuating could be an issue. 3) possibly an immunity issue, which also is linked to the endometriosis. He explained about how the body naturally fights off the endometrial cells when they leave the uterus, but those killer cells can also damage the egg when it is moving between the ovary and fallopian tube, causing it to not be fertilizable. (is that a word?) IVF solves this because the eggs are removed directly from the ovary. So, it can explain why, even though I'm ovulating and my tubes are open, I'm not getting pregnant. He did bloodwork to check my natural killer cells level, they have a treatment for people with high killer cells in IVF cases. Not all doctors believe in the science behind this, but the doctor who founded their clinic has done a lot of research on this and incorporated it into his treatment plans. He thinks there is no male factor in our case. We just did the killer cell bloodwork to see what shows up, but thinks I should go ahead with the IVF at my current clinic. Another interesting thing he said was that there could be a DQ Alpha match which prevents our pregnancy - basically, that we could be too genetically similar. So, it was pretty enlightening. We'll see what the bloodwork turns up.

In other news, heading on vacation from tomorrow till the 20th! Yay! Happy Holidays to everyone and thanks for all your support!